This invention relates to a method for determining the distribution of glycation of erythrocytic membranes and to a device for use in the method.
The deaths of diabetics are mainly due to angiopathy, so it is important to predict the onset of angiopathy for the successful treatment of diabetes. The conventional daily test for diabetes is conducted in the early morning by mainly measuring fasting blood sugar and glycated hemoglobin Alc (HbAlc). As methods for measuring HbAlc, there are known a colorimetry method (Japanese Patent Application Publication Laid-Open No. 8-122335), a high performance chromatography method (Japanese Patent Application Publication Laid-Open No. 9-178719) and so on.
However, these test results cannot be used to evaluate the degree of cell damage or the angiopathy of diabetics. This is the reason why a new method for diagnosing the degree of cell damage of diabetics having a chronic condition of high blood sugar needed to be developed.
Therefore, the inventors tried to develop a new method for determining the distribution of glycation of erythrocytic membranes which can be used to evaluate the degree of diabetic cell damage and a device for use in such method, and they achieved the present invention.